🛒 Selling on Etsy
BolloPrint can connect to your Etsy store so the workshop acts as your operations hub: you publish your products as Etsy listings, you bring into BolloPrint listings you already have on Etsy, and the orders that come in through Etsy show up on their own, with their prices and shipping details. You don't have to copy anything by hand between the two platforms.
This page explains the day-to-day. The initial store connection is set up by an Administrator or Owner just once; from then on anyone on the team with permissions works normally.
The Etsy integration is available on all plans.
Requirements for the integration
Before you start, it's worth having a couple of things ready in your Etsy store. If you already sell on Etsy, you most likely have them all set up: they're normal settings for any store with active listings.
To connect your store you only need an Etsy seller account with the store open.
To publish listings from BolloPrint, your Etsy store must have configured beforehand (it's done once, on etsy.com):
| Requirement | Where it's created on Etsy | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Shipping profile (shipping method) | Store settings → Shipping options | Etsy requires associating a shipping method with every physical listing. |
| Processing profile (preparation time) | Store settings → Shipping options | Etsy requires you to indicate how long it takes you to prepare the order. It's mandatory on every physical listing. |
| Return policy | Store settings → Policies | Etsy requires it for physical products (mandatory in the European Union). |
BolloPrint never modifies your Etsy store — it only reads it. That's why you create these settings yourself once on etsy.com. If any is missing when you publish, BolloPrint tells you exactly which one and where to create it, and it won't end up creating a half-finished listing.
Also, your store cannot be in vacation mode when publishing or re-syncing: while vacation mode is active, Etsy blocks listing activation for external applications.
Connecting your Etsy store
Go to Settings → Integrations and find the Etsy block. Click "Connect": the Etsy page will open so you can sign in with your seller account and authorize BolloPrint. When you're done you'll automatically return to BolloPrint and see your store's name with a green indicator.
From that point on, the Etsy block shows:
- The name of the connected store.
- The status of the connection (green = all good; amber/red = you need to reconnect).
- The last sync.
If the connection expires or you revoke it from Etsy, BolloPrint warns you and you just have to click "Reconnect". The "Disconnect" button cuts the link; your products and orders in BolloPrint are not deleted, but they stop syncing.
The Etsy manager
When your store is connected, a button with the Etsy logo appears on the Products page. It takes you to the Etsy manager, the place from which you do everything related to the store. It has two tabs:
- Import — the listings you already have on Etsy, ready to bring into BolloPrint.
- Publish — your BolloPrint products, ready to upload to Etsy.
In both tabs you can switch between card view and list view, and each item has a three-dot menu (⋮) with its actions: view the product, view the design, open the listing on Etsy, re-sync and unlink. Items that are already linked show the "Linked" label.
Publishing a product on Etsy
In BolloPrint you publish a whole product: it becomes a single Etsy listing and each Variant of the product becomes an option within that listing (the "Variant" dropdown the buyer will see). So a product with three variants is a single listing with three options, not three separate listings.
Publishing is a two-step process: first you create a draft of the listing on Etsy, and then you activate it so it becomes visible. You start from the product's Etsy panel or from the Publish tab of the manager, with the "Draft on Etsy" button.
A window opens where you review and complete the listing details:
| Field | What it's for |
|---|---|
| Title and description | What the buyer will see. They come pre-filled from the product. |
| Category | The Etsy category where it will be listed. It has a search box and a button to browse the full category tree. |
| Shipping profile | One of the shipping profiles you have configured in Etsy. |
| Return policy | One of the policies you have in Etsy. |
| Who made it / When | Details Etsy requires about the handmade product. |
| Tags and materials | Keywords so people can find you. |
| Variants | Each variant with its title (editable: click to change it) and its price. Each variant's title is what the buyer will see in the dropdown, so they must be different from one another. |
| Photos | Up to 20 images per listing. |
About the photos. The listing's general photos come from the Design. In addition, you can assign each variant its own photos. A photo you assign to a variant gets locked (it appears with a padlock) in the general photo strip, so it isn't duplicated; if you remove it from the variant, it becomes available again at the top. The "X / 20" counter keeps track of the total number of distinct photos.
When you confirm, BolloPrint creates the listing on Etsy with all its variants, but as a draft: it's not yet visible to buyers. You'll see it marked with the amber "Draft" label.
To activate it and put it on sale, click the green "Publish on Etsy" button that appears in the product's Etsy panel. If at that moment your store is in vacation mode, Etsy won't let you activate the listing: BolloPrint tells you with a warning and the listing stays as a draft until you turn off vacation mode and click "Publish on Etsy" again. It will never tell you everything went fine if something failed behind the scenes.
To publish you need to already have created in your Etsy store a shipping profile, a processing profile (preparation time) and a return policy. If any is missing, BolloPrint tells you which one; create it on etsy.com (see Requirements for the integration, at the start of this page).
Importing an Etsy listing
If you already sell on Etsy, you can bring those listings into BolloPrint without recreating them. In the manager, Import tab, choose the listing and click "Import".
From the listing, BolloPrint creates for you a Product, its Design (with the listing's photos) and a Piece + Variant for each combination in the listing. Before confirming you review the manufacturing details of each combination —material, finish, weight, time, dimensions and colors— with the same controls you use when creating a design. If all the combinations are the same, "Apply to all" copies the first one to the rest.
The photos work the same as when publishing: those you assign to a piece/variant get locked outside the general gallery so they aren't duplicated.
Keeping the listing up to date
Always manage the catalog from BolloPrint, not from etsy.com. BolloPrint is the source of truth: here you edit the product and then send it to Etsy. That way orders keep matching your variants correctly.
When you change something about an already-published product —title, description, price, variants…— BolloPrint marks it with a red "Unsynced changes" label (you see it in the Etsy manager and in the product's Etsy panel). It's the reminder that the listing on Etsy is out of date.
To bring it up to date, click "Re-sync" —in the product's Etsy panel or in the manager's three-dot menu—. The same publishing window opens, already filled in with the current details; review it and confirm. BolloPrint sends the changes to Etsy and the red label disappears. Re-syncing is lightweight: it only rewrites what has actually changed.
The price is updated on re-sync for products with several variants; for those with a single variant, adjust it directly on Etsy. The quantity/stock is set when publishing and is managed separately.
What if I edited the listing directly on Etsy?
There's no "Etsy to BolloPrint" sync. When BolloPrint detects that the listing has been touched outside, an amber "Edited on Etsy" warning appears in the product's Etsy panel reminding you that your version and Etsy's no longer match. If you changed the listing on etsy.com and want to keep those changes, unlink the product and import it again from Etsy (Import tab). Keep in mind that importing creates new pieces and variants, so afterwards review the recipes. That's why the recommended approach is to always edit from BolloPrint and re-sync.
Unlinking a product from Etsy
If you want to stop managing a listing from BolloPrint, use "Unlink" (in the manager's three-dot menu or in the product's Etsy panel).
Important: unlinking only breaks the link between BolloPrint and Etsy. It does not delete the listing on Etsy, nor your product, design, pieces or orders in BolloPrint. If you also want to remove the listing from Etsy, do it yourself manually on etsy.com. BolloPrint reminds you of this in the confirmation warning.
Etsy orders come in on their own
When a buyer pays for an order on Etsy, within a few seconds it shows up as a new Order in BolloPrint, without you doing anything (Etsy notifies us instantly; also, just in case, BolloPrint does a sweep every hour):
- The customer record is created (or reused) with the shipping details Etsy shares.
- The order is marked with origin "Etsy" and an icon that links to the original receipt.
- Each order line is linked to the corresponding variant in your catalog.
You can filter the order list by Etsy origin to see them at a glance. From there you work the order like any other: production, kanban, etc.
The buyer's shipping address is managed on Etsy. Etsy no longer shares the full postal address or the email with apps like BolloPrint, so to print the label or look up the exact address, go into the order on etsy.com.
How the lines match: the SKU
Each Etsy order line is matched to your catalog by the variant's SKU. The SKU is a stable reference: even if you change prices, photos or texts, the SKU still identifies the variant, and that's why orders keep coming in correctly. You don't need to do anything: if you don't set a SKU for a variant, BolloPrint assigns an automatic one (# followed by its number) when saving. The important thing is that each variant has its own, which already happens on its own.
What does arrive and what doesn't
| Arrives in BolloPrint | Stays on Etsy |
|---|---|
| Variant, quantity, description and price of each line | Buyer's full postal address |
| Etsy Sale Price (what the buyer paid, with shipping) | Buyer's email |
| Shipping cost the buyer paid | Shipping labels |
| Status (paid, shipped, delivered, canceled) |
The order's figures
In an Etsy order you'll see, at the top of the record, the "Etsy Sale Price" —the total the buyer paid on Etsy, with shipping and taxes included— to the left of your Sale Price. And in the financial summary you have the "Shipping cost" (editable), also available for all orders, whether from Etsy or not. The shipping cost is informational: it doesn't change your margin calculation.
What happens if an order comes in "out of sync"?
Sometimes a line of an Etsy order can't find its variant in your catalog. It usually happens when the listing was edited on etsy.com (not in BolloPrint) or when the product changed and wasn't re-synced: the reference no longer matches.
When it happens, BolloPrint doesn't lose the sale or block you: the order comes in anyway, but that line appears without a variant and with a red warning:
Product out of sync, please sync the product or import it again from Etsy.
That line, having no variant, has no recipe, so it can't be produced until you fix it. The rest of the order works normally. You have two ways to resolve it, depending on where the correct version is:
Option 1 — Re-sync (the truth is in BolloPrint). If your product in BolloPrint is the correct one and the Etsy listing fell out of date, open the product and click "Re-sync". The window opens already filled in; confirm and BolloPrint rewrites the listing on Etsy and links it back up. Use it when you made the good changes in BolloPrint.
Option 2 — Re-import (the truth is on Etsy). If the good listing is the one on Etsy (you edited it there), unlink the product and import it again from the manager (Import tab). This recreates the pieces and variants from the current Etsy listing; review the recipes afterwards. Use it when the good changes are on Etsy.
In both cases, after fixing the product, open the order and link the line to the correct variant (or re-import the order if you prefer).
Refunds: Etsy doesn't notify about refunds in real time (there's no webhook). BolloPrint checks them in its periodic sweep (every hour, ~45-day window): if an order has been fully refunded on Etsy, its payment status changes on its own to "Refunded". Partial refunds are NOT reflected automatically (we don't track the partial amount) — adjust them by hand on Etsy and in the order.
Shipping and order statuses
Shipping statuses flow from Etsy to BolloPrint, not the other way around:
- When you mark an order as shipped or delivered on Etsy (with its tracking), BolloPrint receives it and updates the order automatically (moves it to Shipped / Completed) and notes it in the history.
- Tracking and the shipping label are managed on Etsy. Because of Etsy's restrictions for external applications, BolloPrint does not send the tracking number to Etsy: add it in the order on etsy.com and Etsy will notify the buyer. In BolloPrint you can save the tracking for your own internal control.
Cancellations
- If the order is canceled on Etsy, BolloPrint reflects it and notes it in the history.
- If you cancel the order from BolloPrint, remember that the refund has to be done on Etsy — BolloPrint shows you a warning with the link to the receipt, because Etsy doesn't allow refunds from outside its platform.
Something not adding up?
- The Etsy indicator is red → the connection expired or was revoked. Go to Settings → Integrations and click "Reconnect".
- I can't publish → check that in your Etsy store you have a shipping profile, a processing profile (preparation time) and a return policy. BolloPrint tells you in the warning which one is missing.
- I published and got an error warning → if your store is in vacation mode, Etsy won't let you activate new listings and the listing stays as a draft. Turn off vacation mode in Etsy and publish again (or re-sync).
- I entered some odd character in the tags → Etsy doesn't allow certain symbols in tags and materials; BolloPrint cleans them automatically, but if something doesn't show up, review those words.
- An Etsy order isn't showing up → BolloPrint retries on its own every little while; if after a few minutes it still isn't visible, check the connection status.